GARETH Barry admitted Villa were at their lowest ebb under Martin O'Neill following the shock defeat to Leicester.

GARETH Barry admitted Villa were at their lowest ebb under Martin O'Neill following the shock defeat to Leicester.

Matty Fryatt's 76th-minute goal sent them tumbling out of the Carling Cup and Barry could barely find the words to express his disappointment afterwards.

Villa's skipper said: "That is probably the lowest we have felt since the manager has been here. It was probably the worst performance for a long time and we are a bit down at the moment.

"The team the manager put out was definitely strong enough to beat Leicester at home, no disrespect to them.

"They came here and battled well and their gameplan paid off, but there was no spark there from us and after some good performances in the league that is hard to know why."

Barry says his team-mates must quickly raise their spirits ahead of the Premier League trip to Spurs on Monday.

"We are still down today but in this game you can't stay down for too long. We have a tough game at Spurs on Monday. I'm sure there will be a few chats about last night but then we will try and get our heads up for Spurs."

Barry said nothing about the performance had been positive.

"There are no positives. It was a competition we wanted to go far in and we were moaning about getting a home draw. It was the perfect tie, a little derby. But give them respect.

"Leicester kept things tight and got a good goal which Matty Fryatt finished well. We are just disappointed in ourselves that we lost."